Reddit mentions of Anna, Age Eight: The data-driven prevention of childhood trauma and maltreatment

Hey, sorry for what you had to go through and I’m with you on a lot of what you said, while our experiences may have been different the patterns are there.

Also, yeah, I got to the point where I had the family all against me too.

Actually sat across from my millionaire god father who without realizing it at first, started pulling some of the same invalidation shit.

Tried to insinuate that everyone in family sees how I’m wasting my time with this. (Bitch please, ive been working on other things, you just haven’t gotten past level 1)

I respect the guy a lot but at same time I’m like “No!, you will not just act like my experience didn’t exist, nor will you just ignore it or dismiss it. The healthy way to respond to another’s experience is to say ‘Yes and...’ of ‘ I hear you and...”. Followed by several clarifying questions to understand better.

That was a good point, as I guess I threw him off and he didn’t go on to do that. But looked dumbfounded like he didn’t know what to do with that as if no one had ever told him “hey I exist here” and know how to come back at him when he dismisses it.

For the record i noticed as I talked to different members of family I had to accidentally go through a period where I realized my Boundries emotionally and emotional distance had failed me where I took them more serious than i should have.

Then had to restrengthen them. This was the moment I woke up while in front of him.



I explained to someone that I was in a situation where my fearful-avoidant Attachments system was going kinda crazy and had trouble meditating (I live with my closet narc mom now...go figure.)

One lady on the headspace forum said that fearful avoidant attatchment style people tend to struggle a lot with expectations
https://youtu.be/3D5BorKyFfY

If you are fearful-avoidant Attatchment style

This video helped me understand it better and this girl who does the video on YouTube I think so far has the best stuff I’ve found. She may be a fearful-avoidant her self.

Many of us are. As it’s an Attatchment style born out of chaos.

I’m also adhd, with an H. Had have - not sure how that one works honestly. ODD as well and def played the “if you can’t beat them join them game” so I ended up on the right side of the spectrum my self.

There is a whole chapter about people like me in the “Body keeps the score” actually many of us.

It’s called “Developmental Trauma Disorder”

And I looked at it and was like “Holy **! That’s my family”.

Developmental trauma (DT) (or reactive attachment disorder) can manifest in a variety of ways: sensory processing disorder, ADHD, oppositional defiant disorder, *bi-polar, *personality disorders (especially borderline personality disorder), PTSD, cognitive impairment, speech delay, learning disabilities and **more.

Stars indicate number of people in my family with it.
Learning disabilities I just put under most of us because there was really only 1 neurotypical kid out of 4.

Boundries are deliberetly built - get a book and work book - I got the boundries ones. I found despite being really turned off because of the religious aspect of the book (a lot of relationship books seems to do that at times and they are still good despite)

But being adhd, lack of interest is never an excuse. Because I just need to lean in and be open to creating my own interest. And it doesn’t happen instantly but it comes as I get into it.

While it dosent make it all magically easier. - adhd dosent turn off.

When I understood boundaries as what make you bad ass, I finically after watching Sabrina the teenage witch on Netflix and noticing the reason she came off like a bad ass was she had excellent boundaries and they grow as they grow in self concept of self love of self and execution of boundaries and good barbs on the fence (consequences)

On the front of my boundaries workbook I changed the title to “how to be a bad ass!”

This shit is hard enough, and I totally know what you mean by having trouble being dependent or attatched.

Living with the closet narc that became unmasked and then seeing all the signs of emotional abuse I didn’t know where even there kinda makes me crazy.

On some level though I don’t have to lie, I just don’t have to force it, but have my Boundries. I’ve learned too to put them in writing and list them and the consequences out (think of divorces, if the choice wasn’t binary (marriage vs divorce).
It’s frustrating to create that standard because I’m not always sure what to write and have not completed that yet but it’s a goal to be able to articulate clear AF!

Also I wish to introduce everybody to the concept of “Earned Secure Attatchment”
heal for life: Earned Secure Attatchment


“Research has shown that most functions of the pre-frontal cortex are outcomes of secure attachment and that all functions of the pre-frontal cortex are strengthened in mindfulness practice (Graham, 2010).

Neural integration creates coherence in mind and narrative; this can happen when we make sense of our lives, altering our attachment status and gaining “earned secure” attachment (Siegel, 2007).

Earned secure attachment: According to Mary Main, (1995) the primary characteristics of “earned secure attachment” are metacognitional and integrative thinking. This includes the capacity to elaborate a theory of the other’s mind, decentralising, the ability to reflect on one’s mental states, and the establishment of a sense of mastery and personal efficacy. Secure attachment allows the individual to feel safe deconstructing childhood events, cognitions, and affective responses and reconsidering conclusions, then and now.”


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On top of it,
Clearly as we are the ones who have known this pain the most in many ways I sense we have an obligation to really ensure this problem is solved.

I explained my circumstances and my life to some Med students who told me they where learning about aces and how it fits in.

They said the issue in the US “might be fixed in 20 years” to which I said “BS” to that.

Child hood trauma is the largest public health crisis that has been ignored 4x in history.



While we all need to not feel guilty for engaging in this now, as we are all healing. Knowing that we, of all people at some point owe it to the current and next generation of kids, to ensure this topic is dealt with.

Every single chronic health condition in my family is significant associated.
7/10 killers in the country disease wise and also the majority of the most expensive disorders diseases to treat are all associated with it, on top of the smaller things like thyroid or autoimmune disorders and asthma along with many others. The worst part is diabetes is the final result of the lifetime of stress.


Every government, healthcare, education, civic-religious-youth group leaders need to be asked 1 question...

“What’s the plan to prevent childhood trauma, which is at epidemic levels?”

And the book can be gotten on amazon or for free downloaded in ebook from website.

Our kids are not safe That changes now! Anna age 8, the data driven prevention of childhood trauma and maltreatment.


Ana age 8 institute

They have trainings they offer to make every one in those groups of people to target into “Resilience leaders”

This remarkable book is the brainchild of authors Courtney and Cappello, whose empathy, reason and inspired thinking have resulted in a brilliant plan to heal the scars of a generation. Should be required reading for every teacher, every parent, and every public leader from health official to mayor—because this epidemic of trauma is real and must be taken seriously." -Yarrott Benz, teacher and author of The Bone Bridge: A Brother's Story, IPPY gold medal winner


Now you see that we know the problem, we know it costs us shit tons of $$$$$$$$ on every area of life including the education system where it shows up first to the tune of $130-$240 million per day on top of the ungodly astronomical number it costs us in health care that I don’t even want to imagine (universal health care ironically isn’t too expensive if we just stopped treating each other like shit, universal is as much public health measures related to this as other ways of reorganizing that. In an intelligent yet adaptable and responsive way.)

I told those med students that day who said “it might take 20 years”. - “Bullshit- we know the problem, understand it, have the answer, know the cost of ignoring it, and the truth is with all that at our disposal, unless you want to be the ones to explain to Ethan an Anna in 20 years why we did nothing, then we at least have to push to fix this now.”

I woke up to this realizing I have contacts with enough principals from my last job in a non profit that represent 60,000 kids. All I can say is you better believe they will at the least be hearing from me. Some schools are onboard with trauma related car, but not all, and on top of it, those different sectors I talked about haven’t integrated yet which is where the true solving of this problem happens.

A kid dosent just walk into school with “a bruise on his face” one day and everything else is fine at home.

Insert what ever you want in between the “ “

But while we don’t have all tactics laid out locally, we know how to make phone calls and talk to people. We know boundries are and we know what dismissing and invalidation look like- because when people on those positions get awkward, we need to sympathize but still not let them off. Because giving them the choice to explain to Ethan and Anna in 20 years why they didn’t act, or to become a resilience leader to truly solve this problem, that’s what it takes.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1979903077/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_awdb_t1_eaiQAbPWEJPKP